Yes will present three of its seminal works, The Yes Album, Close to the Edge, and Going for the One, played in their entirety at nearly every gig in early 2013. Jambands.com recently sat down with its lone original member, bassist/vocalist/composer, Chris Squire for Part I of our Yes Interviews. In Part II, we discuss the continuing fascination of the magical world of Yes music with its legendary guitarist, Steve Howe. The musician has kept himself busy in a myriad of projects over the last four-plus decades, including work in not one, but two supergroups—Yes and Asia—some trio albums and gigs, solo albums and touring, and other works, which defy categorization. Indeed, as our feature was going to press, Howe departed Asia to focus on Yes and his solo projects. One can see his comments about that former group in the context of this current development.
In the end, Howe is a fascinating and original musician, while being an amiable and friendly conversationalist who, like his Yes band mate Chris Squire, has managed to stay relevant by enjoying his craft, and honing his tools in an ever-changing sonic landscape.
RR: There seems to be a lot of variety in everything you have going on right now—from solo projects to Asia to Yes; everything all at once in a good way, too. I wanted to speak to you about your group activity, but I also wanted to focus on your excellent new solo album, Time, which is a variation on a fine direction for you, too.
SH: Right. Thanks very much. We paid a lot of attention to Time. We kind of developed it more than we recorded it. The creation of it—so much of it was built around the guitar that we didn’t add any other guitars. Besides the two acoustics on “Kindred Spirits,” maybe, everything just has one guitar appearance. We got down some pretty good balance and a lot of great people helped me put that together, so I am very thankful.
RR: Let’s talk about your collaborative work with Paul K. Joyce on Time .
SH: I met Paul four or five years ago. I was looking for an arranger to work with because I realized that the beautiful thing about the keyboard player is that, in a way, they are a great asset when you want to arrange music. What I really wanted was somebody who could write scores and do stuff like that. When I met Paul, he was a composer and he could do some writing with me, and that’s how we started arranging. He wrote a couple of tunes, as well, which, of course, was an added thing for him. He’s done television, a bit of film, a theatrical show, and he’s pretty well-rounded, and he’s fun; he’s a fun guy. He doesn’t live a million miles away, but we live about an hour and a half away from each other. He lives in the western part of England, so he’s been good all around and very solid. He didn’t want Time to come out until he was happy with it, too. Together, we created a standard level that we both could understand and wanted to achieve.
RR: How were the dozen tracks selected for inclusion on Time ?
SH: It went in phases. When I was originally working, I had two pieces—“The Explorer” and “Apollo.” They were completely and utterly different. You couldn’t believe how different they were. They were both about 18 minutes long—each of them. They were just colossal great pieces. But, unfortunately, there were many parts were I wasn’t playing in them, so, originally, I thought, “No, that’s great. We have a good piece of music, but we haven’t got guitar all the time.” There wasn’t guitar for more than 32 bars, or 64 bars—it was a bit much. When Paul K. Joyce came in, we looked at those two pieces, and we were really struggling, and I said, “I love them, but why am I struggling?” He said, “Well, maybe, they’ve got to come down.” We wrote some of it down, and kept the parts we most care about, and, so, that’s an example of the kind of writing we did. We would compose a whole long piece, and, then (laughs), cut it down.
On other levels, what happened was that before I met Paul K. Joyce, I was compiling parts with two pieces, and looking for other material to go with that, and I did cobble something together that was like a synthesized version of maybe half of what’s on Time, and half of other stuff that didn’t really match up. I was trying to think to myself that it was finished, but, then, when I met Paul K. Joyce, I said, “What am I doing? I have been working for years on this already (laughs), and it is so far away from being right.” And, that is sort of the encapsulated story.
RR: You also worked with your son, Virgil Howe, who collaborated with you on “Kindred Spirit,” and laid down a solo on that track, too.
SH: That’s right. Virgil gets a mention, and Dave Biglin, too, who is a fine writer and keyboard player and a friend of mine. There was quite a broad stroke there of people and different sorts from different backgrounds. Of course, three of them are fundamentally keyboard players—Paul K. Joyce, Paul Sutin, and Dave Biglin. Also, Virgil (laughter) is also a keyboard player. That was my wish—to work with keyboard players, but Paul K. Joyce just managed to do the arranging so well.
RR: You also worked outside the Time context with your other son, Dylan Howe, in your jazz trio a few years back with another keyboardist, Ross Stanley.
SH: Ross Stanley, yeah. We have come to an arrangement where we are doing the trio every other year, so I have some material I want us to look at, and we are looking to re-invent the trio a little bit, and see if we could get a tour and a bit more recording. Somewhere in the midst of the Yes and Asia touring schedules, there will be a trio period.
RR: Let’s talk about some of the Yes work, specifically your latest studio album, Fly From Here. Chris Squire said that was the first album that you felt that everyone in the band had all actually liked the album.
SH: Yeah. I did said that. What did he say? I think I said that. I can’t remember. (laughter) The thing about that was that there were stages in the development that were incredibly troublesome and difficult (laughs). None of us completely lost sight of where we were going, so we worked up a system that all of us are renowned for where we soldier on through various situations and, then, the mixing started to come and we had a complete album. Because of Trevor [Horn]’s assistance with the vision of how this would work, and how Fly From Here would become a much bigger piece and include different songs like “Bumpy Ride” from me and other things along the way, he helped that development because we were a bit stifled by changing our keyboard players and looking at our material and wondering, “What are we going to do?” It was a great thing that Geoff Downes and Trevor Horn came in with a fresh batch of songs for us to look at. It was very empowering. It was all happening almost like shifting sand—nobody knew exactly (laughs) what we were targeting, but we were going to get there somehow. We had to go around certain twists and turns and certain falling-outs and certain making-up-agains, so it was a developing album.
I said, “How about some solos?” to Trevor, and he said, “Well, everybody has a solo. That’s nice. Go off and do one.” So, of course (laughs), I was the only person who did go off and do a solo. “Solitaire,” to me, was a golden opportunity. I could record it myself; work on it a bit with Curtis [Schwartz], my audio friend [and engineer], and, then, give it to Trevor. He didn’t edit it. He copied it, basically. I played it on a Dutch guitar I had for about 20 years, an SKD guitar, a handmade maker called [Theo] Scharpach. He makes guitars that really have moments in your life where you’ve got to play it, where you are searching for what guitar to play it on, and this was kind of a crossover solo piece, which is kind of a bit flamenco-y, and, yet, you need a sort of auditorium for the guitar. To round up the album, we did “Hour of Need,” which was supposed to be called “In the Hour of Need,” because I have an instrumental called “Hour of Need.”
RR: You are playing your Portuguese 12-string guitar on Fly From Here’s “Hour of Need.” Is that right?
SH: That’s right. That guitar…I kind of saved that song for Yes as time went by because I felt that I don’t often write things on that Portuguese guitar, and, of course, there’s “Your Move” and “Wonderous Stories,” and it has quite a lot of notoriety (laughs) with Yes. It’s quite a thing that I like to do. It’s an unusual guitar. I don’t tune it conventionally. Lots of guitars use tunes. I don’t actually use any tunes. All my guitars are conventional tunings; my favorite guitar is an E chord, which isn’t really conventional, you can see it on the guitar—it’s got to be used. But on the Portuguese, the top string is A flat, which really gives it a certain sound.
RR: Let’s talk about the unconventional nature of your talent, especially at such an early age when you began playing guitar. You had such a strong skill set so soon.
SH: I see. That’s an interesting phrase. When I look back, it’s quite surprising that ten years after I started playing, I was touring with Yes. (laughs) In a way, that’s quite remarkable…I guess, after about five years…let’s see…12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17…yes, five years, when I started making records, that’s when I got very excited about the guitar. Before that, although I was in a band, I also wanted to be a sort of strummer in the background of a band. And that is what a guitar has done all the time. But, mind you, from an early age, I was influenced by Les Paul and learning Chet Atkins when I discovered him when I was 13. I think I heard guitarists who my friends and I sat around saying, “That has to be two guitarists,” and I said, “No, surely it’s one.” Eventually, I learned to play how you could sound almost almost like two guitars—one accompanying and one playing the tune.
First, of course, in England, we were very naïve about learning about rock ‘n roll and about learning the guitar; although, we had great guitarists like John Williams and Julian Bream, and we had some good rock guitarists, actually, and the famous Mick Green from [Johnny Kidd &] the Pirates, and Brian Griffiths from The Big Three, George Harrison, and Eric Clapton, and there were a lot of great players—you could go on all day; there were a lot of great guitarists coming through at that time. Within about ten years, I was playing with those guys on tour with Delaney & Bonnie with Eric Clapton & Friends. I was sort of sharing the stage with them—not actually playing with them; but, I might have been able to do that—I was seeing what the future could hold and, lo and behold, the next two months later, I am in Yes.
So there was a fascinating drive from me to play the guitar. Within ten years (and, they say that they think ten years is what you need to learn an instrument—a hundred thousand hours of playing), so that is pretty on target.
But the one thing I was was different (laughs) from other guitarists. That was troublesome, in a way, to be honest. When I started, I was almost terrified that I wasn’t like anybody else, but, in a way, however much I struggled to be like other people, I never sounded like them. (laughs)
When I did The Yes Album, which was my first major recording (I had done a few other things, a lot of things in the 60s), that was a very unusual record. Tony Kaye [Yes keyboardist on The Yes Album ] was very brilliant at supporting me, letting me open out and play a lot of lead lines. Yeah, those first ten years were a real education, but I was recording with Joe Meek after five years and I was learning about playing on stage for those ten years, really, because I was pretty busy.
RR: Your distinctive sound has been very influential, but never really imitated, and I would think that must be a satisfactory feeling to have as an innovative guitarist.
SH: Well, I know a lot of guitarists and some of them do say to me that they love to steal bits from me and they like to copy me. One of them even said to me, not long ago, on a recording they sent to me, “Can you hear that?” What he meant was ‘could I hear that he was mimicking me a bit?’ That is quite flattering, but what I do is not really about one particular sound. Somebody might do something similar to what I might do on a certain kind of guitar, but, there again, I did bring acoustic guitar and steel guitar forwards a little bit into the spotlight, so to speak, in rock and progressive. (laughs) Not that I was the only one doing it, but I did bring something to it, and that was exciting because I’m really a guitar family player and I don’t just play one guitar, one sort of guitar, as we talked about when we discussed Time. I purposely avoid doing that. When I play the trio, I don’t avoid it because I play one guitar all the time. The trio has a wonderful consistency of sound, and it really is the way to do that kind of music. You don’t fool around with the sound too often. That’s also very nice, so I get the best of both worlds, I hope.
RR: In the Present, the new live DVD/CD set, is a solid example of your playing, which is a good one for older fans to appreciate, and something where a new one can come along and say, “Oh! So, that’s what everyone has been telling me about.”
SH: (laughs) Well, songs like “Siberian Khatru,” or the songs which are guitar-based, I always listen to the originals and use that, but, also, it is a moment to go elsewhere to try other things. This was something I loved very much from Bill Bruford where Bill would say before he went on, every now and then, he’d say, “Tonight, I am going to play every drum bit, every drum fill, differently.” (laughter) And he would, too. There would be no familiarity. He was always going to change things. That used to shock us; it used to horrify us. It used to also keep us on our toes. Improvisation is a wonderful thing, and it demands some structure. It is wonderful that Chris has always been helping with those structures, building those structures, building those moments, being part of it.
There are many good qualities about the kind of music Yes makes, but it isn’t easily defined. There again, that was the goal of prog—to be kind of indescribable, really. (laughs) When you think of Tales from Topographic Oceans in 1973, we were obviously going in a strange direction, but we were influenced by things that we weren’t playing. We weren’t playing like John McLaughlin’s Mahavishnu Orchestra. We liked to think that where we were going was taking some of that along with us—Stravinsky, Vivaldi, McLaughlin—and it was all things at all times; the crossroads was music with John McLaughlin’s music and other music we loved at the time like in the 80s and how much I liked Steve Morse and Dixie Dregs. There were those amazing times when you just happily felt part of the musical genre (laughs) that you were…that’s a funny word- genre. (laughter)
RR: Indeed. Both Yes and Asia have a rich history with various textures. When you go to play with Asia is your mindset a little different for that type of music? Are you focusing on the other band members in a different way based on the project? Or, are you ‘Steve Howe’ and you are playing within your own set of established ideas?
SH: It is not difficult. It never creates a problem with me. I don’t even think about it, actually. What helps me not think about it is a) I’m working with different people and we have a different mindset, and b) Asia’s got a career mindset as much as Yes. When I pick up a guitar and it’s an Asia project, you know, I keep things Yes-like more for Yes, but every now and again, little things crossover. Yeah, it’s…it’s vital that I can develop a style for each band and not really have to think about it. And it is partly, as you said, because it is that the music is coming to me and what I can contribute to them and I do love people contributing or playing my music, too. That happens with Asia more regularly in the last couple of albums because it was a strength that the first album had. There was a little bit of other colors in it besides the very powerful and wonderful Geoff and John [Wetton] songs, so it was indicative of Asia, if you like, and my music brings a sort of twist in that nice thing because they contribute to it.
The thing I was going to say immediately, but I will save for last, is that of course I play different guitars. On stage, I do. On stage, as you probably know, I keep Asia very simple. I play only one guitar the whole night, end of story. And I like that very much. That guitar is very versatile. It is a unique guitar Gibson hasn’t made for about three years called an ES Artist. That’s a certain type of guitar which works for me on stage.
But in the studio, funnily enough, the guitars do mix. I take the Strats, the steel, the Martin, the Gretsch—I take a bundle of guitars in the studio with whomever I am working with, so I can make the music, but what I play on them is more important than what the sound of them is, and that is changed by the environment I might be in. I know the kinds of things Asia like and the things they’d like from me. It’s different, so it is wonderful to have that.
The ultimate thing is to pick up the acoustic guitar and play for the whole evening on that. And that reminds me how central that is and, fortunately, I do play about every night with Asia and Yes—and usually I play two pieces—from my acoustic guitar repertoire, “The Clap” being the most famous one. But I don’t often play that, so I play from my repertoire. That keeps another part of me, which isn’t anything to do with Yes or Asia (laughs), but also, strange enough, part of Yes because they allowed me to do “The Clap” on The Yes Album and “Mood for a Day” on Fragile because I really did do a solo, so, really the groups have allowed me to get the opportunity to really be focused on playing a Spanish guitar or the folk guitar. But, really, I don’t need them when I’m doing that, so it is quite an interesting solidarity or independence.
RR: I’m impressed with the depth, variety and longevity of your career. When you move forward, are there new things that you want to accomplish, things you haven’t tried or done yet, or do you feel very fulfilled on so many levels at this point?
SH: Well, yes, that’s an interesting question because sometimes I don’t really have time to think about the future. There are other times—periods of months and weeks and hours—that I think about other things that I do want to do. Yes, there certainly are. I’ve always got projects on the back burner. I’ve got some of those. People ask me, “How did you do Time ?” (laughs) Well, it went across the whole period when I was doing other things and I could take spaces out of it and create that recording, so I do the same as that, but more of a…recordings are great fun and I’ve got a couple of recordings that I am working on at the moment that are fun because they are going to be a bit sideways, but thinking about an overall career move is actually really really important. The typical thing to do is to pull yourself out of one thing and dust it off and try something else.
Music needs that every now and again and there is going to come a time when I am going to want to thin out all that I am doing, so I can get proper focus, even up to two years, on other thoughts and projects that I’d like to do, but it certainly depends on how things go. (laughs) I am never going to be the person to stick my head in the oven. I always want to think that I’m going to be able to sense with some level of commerciality that is sensible, but, then again, there are other goals that I don’t exactly want to disclose because like with Time I didn’t want to talk about it with a great deal of people because it would give it away. Yeah, I’ve got some other pet projects that haven’t yet really ever been done.
There again, reinventing the trio a bit, carrying on with Yes and Asia, will be quite productive, so, in there, yeah, I will be planning on moving towards a more focused on, maybe, one of the styles that I haven’t focused on in a little while. It probably won’t be blues. (laughs) It’ll probably be rock, but maybe a style of music that deserves more attention from me, and if that still feels the same way to me, then after a while, I’ll want to go there, and do some things that are in that style of music, which is another part of playing the guitar.
RR: A fine spot to find oneself.
SH: Yeah, I hope I can be that lucky to have that opportunity because some of these bands do go on a long time and we have been together a long time. It’s a wonderful thing; people enjoy it. I don’t want to be a party pooper. (laughter)
